The Red House Mystery by A.A. Milne
My rating: 1 of 5 stars

I an see why a.A. Milne didn’t see another mystery published. This one is a mighty stretch of reality that is poorly written and seems to have been written as the writer was thin king it all out.

The story opens well and i settled in with what I suspected a mystery in an English setting. Instead, I find myself, after the evil is done, slogging through, what seems, endless patter about what-might-have-happened, what-could-have-have-happened, who-did-it, who-didn’t, etc. All of this barely moving the story along at all for decades of pages.

Worse, the characters are never defined except for the beginning. Making this all worse involves two main characters who pretend to be Holmes and Watson. Seems Milne knew he had troubles defining characters, so he uses others to do it for him.

The solution is intellectually dishonest. Today would be impossible, but pretty hard to believe that such a mistake could have been made even in the 1920s.

Bottom line: I do not recommend this book.

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At the symposium of Florida springs last week, Scott Mitchell (above) gave an abbreviated talk of the history of the Silver Springs property. While initially sketching this out at the event, the idea of a telescope to the past came to mind. I was going to go further with a coin machine attached. I was going to keep the background blank and realized I needed to tie Scott to Silver Springs State Park.

While helping sell the new Swampy’s Florida Valentine line of greeting cards, I also did a small drawing on the back. A wife was telling me about her husband and his liking of the Gil-Man, of the ‘Creature from the Black Lagoon’ movie. He also likes hot dogs. So, the imagery above. Below is a photo of me drawing during the event February 2nd.

Here’s my latest editorial cartoon drawn today reflecting from a true media legend, Shirley Temple. Temple died this past Sunday at the age of 85. We will NEVER see someone like Tmple again. Society won’t allow it, as many other things are censored and not allowed. The cartoon above is speaking to our narrow view of the world today.

The Brothers O’Brien by William W. Johnstone

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is one Hell of a good book. Not much for using “Page turner”, but page turning I was. Don’t know who in the Johnstone Clan wrote this, but this is the best I’ve read of the twelve or so read so far. The ghost writer really got the idea of early Johnstone books of defining characters and fleshing out story. Seems this might be a writer that had not written any of the other books I’ve read so far. Very good work.

One of the best things of this book is that the plot that develops in the second half of the book is very different from the other Johnstone books. There are some characters that are very different and even a bit of a sorcery angle spilled in. There is a cat in this book that is really well placed. Was never sure just how this book would end, except that this is still another series and that the brothers would survive. That’s something else in this book, as was the case with earlier Johnstone novels, mot everyone survives. There are some who meet their fate in ways very unexpected. Really like the levels as they get built throughout the book.

After a series of mediocre to bad Johnstone books, this charges me on to the dozens of others I’ve collected over the past year.

Bottom line: I recommend this book!

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This is part of the Florida Trail Association cartoon I illustrate for each issue of their Footprint magazine. The Florida Trail Association is the organization for hiking throughout Florida. I need to occasionally post some of the cartoons I made for past issues. I won’t be posting the current cartoon, though, as that’s one of the benefits of membership when getting the Underfoot magazine. 🙂

Tons of artwork has to get done today! From caricatures to hiking cartoons to illustration, etc! Was hoping to be at a presentation today by Rick Smith, son of author Patrick Smith who wrote the Florida legendary book, ‘A Land Remembered’, but that looks impossible two hours before his presentation. Pen to paper and I’ll post what I can.

On January 28th I was part of a symposium about the condition of our springs in north Central Florida. My part was to illustrate each of the speakers. This is one of Ryan Smart, of the Florida Conservation Coalition, who spoke of legislation to help cover the issues of our Florida springs.

Here’s a piece of the Swampy’s Florida weekly cartoon that will appear tomorrow. The subject is Ma Barker, the famous gangster who met her end in Florida.

Tampa: Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow by Michael Bane and Mary Ellen Moore

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is more of a sales book of Tampa than anything else. There is certainly plenty of history here and that part is very well written. Then the book steers into the future and suddenly statistics and construction plans fill the pages. Seems the first and second parts were written by two different people, which would explain the two authors.

There are plenty of photos strewn throughout. All black and white except for a few center pages of color.

The history presented is mostly complete, though sections are missing. Little is mentioned of the mob activity or anything at all about the black community.

The book is best as a time capsule of life in Tampa in 1980. So very much is written about upcoming projects at the time, community committees planning the future, construction firms and banks.

Bottom line: I recommend it to anyone wanting to know of Hillsborough County’s history.

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Because I keep politics out of the web of this website, this is a pantomime performance of these cartooned characters set up for this week’s editorial cartoon. Feel free to caption this yourself below!

This was penciled on paper, inked the same, scanned and colored.